A Wilderness Experience

Have you ever had the opportunity to fly in a bush plane and land in the heart of the largest Wilderness complex in the lower forty-eight states?

A highlight of the MOSS Graduate Program is the annual spring semester adventure to the Taylor Wilderness Research Station (TWRS). Embedded within the heart of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, TWRS is a one-of-a-kind venue for scientific discovery combined with the opportunity to explore the social and political impacts of human economics on natural resources. Surrounded by over four million acres of Wilderness in central Idaho, the station provides outstanding access, facilities and logistical support for research on natural environments and processes.

The annual trip is designed as an interdisciplinary wilderness immersion that culminates
coursework taken at MOSS. For example, students’ winter ecology course ends with an exploration of relationships forged between people and plants. Students also complete their science communication course by developing and sharing environmental communication narratives that merged science and wilderness experience. There is no better place for such a capstone experience, one that our students never forget.

Student Reflections

"I don’t think that my time at MOSS would have been as impactful without the trip to Taylor. It was an exceptional capstone to our year, tying everything that we had learned together and at the same time, expanding the scope of our knowledge."

--Laura Waksman

"Taylor Ranch is a place where the natural world is valued more than our schedules, and where human interaction and connection is facilitated by the expansive landscape."

--Sadie Perrin

"After having spent most of the last year talking about sense of place, how to connect people to nature, and what values nature holds, Taylor is one of the places I feel most connected to and miss most often."